Troubles setting up the mac (Networking)

[Darold]

Hello again,

I am trying to have my two computers work well together. My primary goal is to keep my PC as a command center that my Mac will be able to grab stuff from wirelessly. One goal is to use my mac as a media center, getting information off of the external hard drive in the other room (hooked up to the PC) wirelessly.
All my songs and videos are located on this drive (iTunes library). How can I access this drive wirelesly from the mac? I do have a wireless network, but am not sure exactly how to set it up so that I can access my printer and external hard drive. Using Front Row, I can easily get them from the sahred subfolders. I was hoping to use the same iTunes library from my PC as my Macs library, not just playing it from a "shared" list. Another goal is to access pictures etc. from this external drive.

When I go to the finder, under networks, Mshome I see my PC and my roomates computer from the Mac. Click on my PC, "Hard Drive" OR "Shared Folder" and it says "The alias 'vaio' could not be opened, because the original item could not be found."

Please let me know what I am overlooking this time.

 

[frankblundt]

There are two issues to deal with.

One is "Troubles setting up the PC (Networking)". I'm no expert in this area, but I suspect you will need to set up sharing for the external volume and the printer, on the PC. It's generally easiest to eliminate all possible barriers to success, mostly to do with security (Firewall off, Guest accounts on, wireless encryption off etc), while you get it working, then add them back in one by one to make sure it all still works. Windows file sharing is a mystery beyond contemplation for me, but the settings are all in there somewhere..

On the Mac side, accessing PCs has got easier with every OS release, but Samba (which is what Macs use to access Windows networks) can still be a bit flakey - mostly the issues are to do with authentication. One thing that can sometimes help is to check Applications > Utilities > Directory Access: Services tab > highlight SMB/CIFS, click Configure and enter MSHOME as your Workgroup (if that's the Workgroup you're using on the PC). Another is instead of using the Finder browser, press Apple+K instead and try to access the shared volume directly:
eg: smb://vaio/music
sometimes using the IP address (if you know it) instead of the network name is more successful
eg: smb://10.0.0.2/music
if you're using user accounts (Samba success with Guest accounts not as great as you might hope, in my experience)
you can enter the as much of the full path too, using the format

smb://workgroupname;username:password@ipadressorcomputername/sharedvolumename

eg: smb://MSHOME;Me:secret@vaio/music

The printer (God willing) if it's been shared on the PC side should show up in Printer Setup Utility: Add Printer If it doesn't show up in the browser, click More Printers > Windows Printers, choose your Workgroup, pick the PC from the list (it will ask for a valid Windows User Account login name and password - not your Mac username/password - if you haven't opened it up), and then you can see and select the printer.

If that doesn't work you can hold down the Option key when clicking More Printers, and instead of Windows Printers, choose Advanced > Device: Windows Printer via SAMBA and go through the same egregious process as above to try and connect with the printer via its SAMBA url
eg: smb://MSHOME;Me:secret@vaio/hplaser

 

[Darold]

There aretwo issues to deal with.

One is "Troubles setting up the PC (Networking)". I'm no expert in this area, but I suspect you will need to set up sharing for the external volume and the printer, on the PC. It's generally easiest to eliminate all possible barriers to success, mostly to do with security (Firewall off, Guest accounts on, wireless encryption off etc), while you get it working, then add them back in one by one to make sure it all still works.

I did have the items shared, but am afraid to turn off the firewall and encrption.

On the Mac side, accessing PCs has got easier with every major OS release, but Samba (which is what Macs use to access Windows networks) can still be a bit flakey. One thing that can sometimes help is to check Applications > Utilities > Directory Access: Services tab > highlight SMB/CIFS, click Configure and enter MSHOME as your Workgroup (if that's the Workgroup you're using on the PC).

Thanks, I will try this out.

 

[epiphany]

Some info on networking

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/54704/

and maybe some insights on iTunes sharing...http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20070424081346722

 

[frankblundt]

I did have the items shared, but am afraid to turn off the firewall and encrption.

You only need to disable it long enough to get things working, and if it stops working when you add them back in (one at a time), you know that's the problem and not something else.

More stuff added above, and yes, have a look at the general networking guides